EL SEGUNDO – Derek Forbort first pulled on an NHL jersey five years ago, on a makeshift stage inside Staples Center. Now he gets to do it again, for real, on a much bigger metaphorical stage.

Forbort is set to make his NHL debut for the Kings on Friday night when they play Minnesota. Forbort will take his first shifts on the same surface on which the Kings drafted the defenseman in 2010, in the first round.

“I think I always knew if I stayed the course and kept working hard and kept working on my game and developing, that it would eventually come,” Forbort said after Thursday’s practice.

It’s a full-circle moment for Forbort, 23, considered something of a project when the Kings selected him with the No.15 overall pick. Indeed, Forbort had to climb through three seasons of college hockey (North Dakota) and two full seasons in the AHL before he made the Kings out of training camp last month.

Forbort will become the last of the 30 players selected in the 2010 first round to make his NHL debut. The Ducks’ Cam Fowler, selected three spots ahead of Forbort, has played 348 NHL games.

“It helps knowing that if you stay patient, your time will come,” Forbort said, “and if you put the work in down there (in the AHL), you’ll get your chances here.”

Forbort (6-foot-4, 212 pounds) is considered a rangy defenseman with good puck-moving skills, although he totaled only 5 goals and 27 assists in 141 AHL games. Since his draft day, though, Forbort has improved his all-around game and he had a plus-32 rating while in the AHL.

Veteran defenseman Matt Greene, who missed part of Tuesday’s game and didn’t practice with the full team Wednesday or Thursday, is expected to sit out Friday. That means Forbort, a native of Duluth, Minn., will play against his hometown team.

The Kings’ plan is to partner Forbort with veteran Christian Ehrhoff and see how the game progresses. It’s never simple, Coach Darryl Sutter indicated, to predict how a young player will respond to his NHL debut.

The Kings also plan to keep Drew Doughty with Brayden McNabb, and pair Jake Muzzin with Alec Martinez. Greene, believed to be dealing the recurrence of an upper-body injury he suffered in training camp, did some skating and drills after Thursday’s practice.

BACK TO WORK

The Kings, looking to avoid the first 0-4 start in franchise history, apparently will not make any line-combination changes after their shutout loss to Vancouver on Tuesday.

With two days between games, the Kings held longer-than-usual practices and, not surprisingly, focused them on generating scoring chances.

“We’ve done a lot of end-zone work, power play stuff, transition stuff,” Sutter said. “You know what? Our team’s very seldom about a work thing. ... Instead of being a little bit more patient, they’re trying to force it a little bit. Our attitude’s not an issue, with any of that. It’s just getting a result.”

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